1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to document control architectures for use in data processing systems and, more particularly, to a technique for the dynamic selection of logical element data format based on logical element characteristics that are established as a document is created or modified.
2. Description of the Prior Art
When editing a document, changes in logical element relationships do not dynamically result in changes to the format of the data portion of a logical element. For example, an author may indent the first paragraph of each section of a document and block subsequent paragraphs in the document. When the first paragraph of a section is moved using existing state of the art editors, paragraph reformatting must be explicitly specified by the user if the movement results in a change of paragraph order within sections. New first paragraphs that were originally blocked must now be indented by entering indent commands or by linking the paragraph to a style sheet that specifies indented paragraph style. Similarly, indented paragraphs that are no longer first paragraphs must now be blocked by entering commands that cancel the indenting or by linking the paragraph to a style sheet that specifies blocked paragraph style.
A specific example in the so-called desktop publishing field is Xerox's Ventura Publisher product. This product uses style sheets into which text, graphic, table and/or image data may be imported from other application programs such as word processors, spread sheets and the like. Some style sheets are included with the product, and the user may generate other style sheets either by modifying existing style sheets or inputting the specifications for style sheets from scratch.
Once text has been imported, chapter headings, subheadings, first paragraphs and other document elements can be tagged resulting in formatting of the data according to predefined characteristics. For example, the first paragraph of a chapter might be formatted blocked with the first letter of the first sentence being a 36 point type size of a particular font with the rest of text characters in 10 point size and flowing around the first letter. However, in the course of editing the document, if the first paragraph is moved or changed, then the tags must be deleted and new tags applied to the new first paragraph. In other words, the tags are attached to and go with the paragraph. The same is true of other document elements such as titles, headings and the like.